


I Want A Face That's Fair This Time

by Soundingonlyatnightasyousleep



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Romance, X-Men: Dark Phoenix (Movie) Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2020-05-18 16:57:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19338706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Soundingonlyatnightasyousleep/pseuds/Soundingonlyatnightasyousleep
Summary: Charles is trying to be an honest man.The last scene of Dark Phoenix, slightly rewritten.





	I Want A Face That's Fair This Time

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Lover Lover Lover" by Leonard Cohen. 
> 
> Dashed off after watching Dark Phoenix. As tagged, spoilers! Also as tagged, this fic deals with internalized homophobia.

Charles is working on breaking out of old habits, finding a new path away from the man he used to be, becoming an honest and forthright man. He had already resolved to go on sabbatical away from the school when Scott, clearly deputized by Hank, had awkwardly delivered the news that they thought Charles should take an early retirement. _You’re a coward to the last_ , he had wanted to send back to Hank, but he had held his tongue. The best proof of Hank’s cowardice was the years he had spent by Charles’ side, after all. And he had been trying to be a better man, even though every time over the years he forces himself out of the wreckage of a fresh disaster, he feels the pulls of his old orbit more keenly. So maybe he deserves some small sympathy for feeling instinctive relief at Erik finding him in Paris. A new-old game for them to play.

 

When Erik does what Charles has been sensing he would do the whole time and asks him to join him on Genosha, he is not surprised at the offer itself so much as the bend of Erik’s shoulders. He’s not prepared for how soft Erik is, in face and hands and mind. He bites down his bitterness at the ease Erik somehow occupies after having turned again from vengeance and violence on a dime, back and again and back for decades. Isn’t he tired at having to build his worn grace yet again?

 

Erik’s immediate insistence at having Charles choose a chess piece from his proffered fists is more familiar. He had never been able to finely pluck at emotions and push another’s decisions into place, his charm melting away into obstinacy worn on his sleeve whenever he wanted something, even something as simple as a chess game.

 

“Pick a hand,” Erik says.

 

“Can we talk about what it would look like? Me on Genosha?” Charles sigh-laughs.

 

“Pick first,” Erik insists, the clench of his fingers around the chess pieces causing his shoulders to flex. Charles sighs again, and taps his right hand. He already knows that he will go with Erik. He is only unsure if it truly is the easy choice again, if he will look up from their game later to find that he has been neglecting the world when he thought himself a responsible steward.

 

Erik opens his hand to show only empty air. “Wrong,” he says. Uncharacteristically, he doesn’t smirk or sound at all smug, only peers intently at Charles.

 

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” says Charles, raising an eyebrow. “Are you telling me which color to play?”

 

“Try again,” is all he replies with.

 

Charles knows what it is the second he brushes the back of Erik’s left hand, feels the impression of its weight falling in Erik’s mind.

 

Erik had not offered him a home on Genosha out of pity. He suspects that Erik is incapable of pitying him.

 

He stares at the silver ring sitting in his palm.

 

“I...I’ll make you a fine home,” Erik says lowly, looking up at him through his lashes. Color sits high on his cheeks. “Even if you don’t--You must know that I’ve always…”

 

Around them, a few Parisians are sneering at him with the annoyance reserved for American tourists. A few more are feigning urbane unaffectedness at seeing some of the world’s most famous mutants in a hushed conversation. None have realized what’s happening in front of them yet. He could still blind them with his telepathy if they did.

 

These days, it was much easier to be a homosexual, he thinks. Raven had rolled her eyes at him when he had said as much, told him that no one called themselves _a homosexual_ anymore, he thinks.  

 

Erik’s open hand hovers over Charles’ palm.

 

He’d always felt that Erik looked at him like he could see the thing creeping up the walls of his chest cavity whenever he looked at his beautiful hands, same as he could see through Charles’ little hypocrisies. It had inspired terror in him even as he’d wanted to pull Erik’s secrets to him, to know him and know him and know him, keeping pace with every graceful turn Erik makes.

 

As he looks at Erik now, he is struck for the first time with the secret that Erik was never sure of his desire. He is not sure now. Only hopeful.

 

Charles is trying to be an honest man now. He will, he laughs ruefully at himself, let Erik make an honest man of him.

 

“I know you will,” he finally chokes out to Erik, still soft with hand outstretched. “I mean, I will. Yes.”

 

He has hardly ever touched Erik. When he has given the odd shoulder clasp or brush of the hand, their first meeting echoes in the touch. Even in his most joyful moments, Erik’s body is eternally in the throes of a fight.

 

But now, Erik trembles finely as he gently slides the ring on his finger and kisses the back of his hand, once, twice. It is a return and something wholly new all at once.

 

Around them, some cafegoers start to lazily clap, finally realizing that they’re witnessing a proposal. Charles closes his mind to their thoughts and laces his fingers even more tightly through Erik’s.

**Author's Note:**

> Was the ending scene of Dark Phoenix at all earned? No. Did I immediately start internally screaming because the chess piece thing would have made a great proposal? Yes.
> 
> Between that and the fact that this movie did not contain a miserable attempt to convince us that Charles Xavier is heterosexual, here we are! 
> 
> (Uh, I suppose I also want to disclaim that I hate the politics of Genosha as a story but there wasn't really room to go into that. But trust me, I am a certified Genosha-hater.)


End file.
